The Family - Racial Breakdown Of Families With Children

In this panel we take a look at the distribution of single-parent households by race and ethnicity for the most recent period available, March 2000. Four bars are presented for each race as well as for Hispanics¹². The light bar stands for the percentage of households raising children with two parents in the home. The other bars show the percentages of single-parent households by head of household, mother, father, or neither parent.

Other than for African Americans, two-parent households are by far the most common. Within the black community, this is no longer the case. More than half of all black children are being raised in single-parent households — 49% are being raised exclusively by their mothers and 4% by their fathers. An additional 9% live with neither parent. This leaves only 38% who are being raised in two-parent households.

This situation has caused growing concern among community leaders. The "Million Man March" in Washington D.C. (10/95) gathered black men for a day-long rally. The Promise Keepers, a Christian group, also had a large gathering of men in the capital (10/97). Both gatherings, although very different in nature, had one common aim: to rededicate men to basic moral, social, cultural, and political ethics — as fathers, brothers, husbands, and members of their communities. In 1998 a conference was held at Morehouse College in Atlanta, Georgia. It brought together prominent black leaders and was designed to address the issue of African American fathers. The statement paper that was issued at the conclusion of the conference, and summarizes its finding, says:

"In the eyes of the sponsors, and for many participants, the Morehouse Conference was an important moment. The group did not agree on everything, but it did agree unequivocally that African American children deserve strong and positive relationships with their fathers and that reversing the trend of father absence must rise to the top of the agenda for African Americans and for the nation. We agreed that both the economic structures, the cultural values, and the private and public sector policies that discourage many black men from becoming active in their children's lives demand urgent attention."

A new consensus was forming. In the 90s, research came out showing that failed marriages and poor single-parent families produce extremely high social costs. The resulting "family friendly" consensus was not yet visible when in 1992 Dan Quayle blasted the popular sit-com "Murphy Brown" for its casual attitude towards fatherless childbearing. His comments ignited a firestorm of protest and a national debate. By the late 1990s, however, the mood had changed. In an interview, Candice Bergen, the actress who played Murphy Brown, told the Los Angeles Times that Dan Quayle had picked the right theme to support. She said of the show's single-parenting plot, "I didn't think it was a good message to be sending out." (Popenoe).

Government policies were also changing. Passage of a welfare reform act in 1996, discussed in the last panel, was yet another sign of both changing attitudes and policies regarding out-of-wedlock childbearing. These changes appear to be having an impact.

Between March 1996 and March 2000 the percentage of children who were living with just one parent declined. This change was most dramatic within the black community. As striking as the figures in the initial chart are, they are an improvement over the situation that existed just four years earlier in 1996. As a percentage, two-parent homes in the African American community increased from 34% in 1996 to 38% in 2000.

The percentage of children being raised by single parents has stopped growing. Changing public policies and attitudes about the healthiest environment for children make it easy to imagine that the decline in single-parent households, in favor of two-parent households, may mark the beginning of a new trend. Time will tell.

Source: U.S. Bureau of the Census. Household Relationship and Living Arrangements of Children under 18. Online. Available: http://www.census.gov/population/socdemo/hh-fam/p20-537/2000/tabC2.txt. March 2000; Household Relationship and Presence of Parents for Persons Under 18 Years. March 1996; Morehouse Research Institute & Institute for American Values. Turning the Corner on Father Absence in Black America. p.1. David Popenoe. " New Day Dawnin? In the struggle over the family, foundations make the difference." Philanthropy Magazine (March/April 2002). Available online at http://www.philanthropyroundtable.org/magazines/2002/March/.